Desperation
by JacklynK
Summary: Whatever happened to that woman Riddick left unconscious in the guard room?
1. gonna kill me

I was writing another story and wondered suddenly what happened to that merc that Riddick left unconscious in the guard room. Maybe a one-shot, I don't know. I don't want to add installments if there's no hope for her, so there's your motivation to review, y'all. If you can think of someplace for this to go, I'm completely open to suggestions, as well as, of course, any improvements you think I can make to what I already have.

As always, I don't own anything or anybody.

- -

The pain came first, drifting in and swallowing her like hot mud. She slugged into an unstable consciousness, but after all that fight to open her eyes, she wished she hadn't bothered. At first uncomprehending, her cracked eyes focused on the dark looming figure of the most dangerous man in the universe. Fuck…

She had to react, at the very least get away, find the crew, break wide through the tunnel, maybe there was still time. But her muscles didn't react, they stayed ultra-gravitated to the floor as if the command to reach for her gun had never been. Her guns weren't even there, she remembered. She had pulled them already, and now they're gone. Riddick's killer hands came closer, and she mustered every gram of energy to at least verbally challenge. _( gain control of the situation maybe I can survive this ) _But even the fierce words were lost, and all her screaming abdomen could manage was

"'You gonna kill me?"

And as she asked, the woman found she didn't even care. This quiet can only mean one thing: there's no such thing as the crew anymore. It's an apt question after all, it's all over, whoever's getting a hold of that ship, it ain't gonna be her. It would be nice, almost, to hear Him answer in the affirmative. It would be a mercy, to die now rather than live the future she saw through her dimmed eyes. Anything, anything but that. The killing hands reached closer and passed beyond her vision.

But he only took the cuff keys from her belt. He focused on his wrists and turned the slightest bit away from her, dismissively. Riddick hadn't expected to find anyone alive here, but it would be empty satisfaction to kill the fucking she-merc. She's broken now, wounded and abandoned amongst the worst incarcerated convicts in the universe. It would be a mercy to kill her now, in other words, a waste of fucking time. He dropped the cuffs at her feet and moved on to bigger matters. Kyra.

In complete horrified despair, she tumbled back into unconsciousness, chased down by the pain of her wounds and the thought of being left here to die or worse, to live. To be _here,_ forever. A lone female merc in the worst prison in existence. Oh god… She drowned through deep, desperate nightmares for what felt like all time, like there was never anything else, she was always about to be butchered since the beginning of time. But the sounds were getting louder, and despite her wish to just sleep here, survival instinct kicked in and dragged her awake again.

The first thing she consciously heard was herself, despite any effort to stay quiet, her body refused to obey and stop moaning. But her concentration on her own vocal chords was broken when she realized that it was not her own noise that woke her. Riddick was gone, dawn was coming, and the inmates below were drawing the courage to come up. Her eyes darted fearfully and she started making small scared sounds of desperation. The woman wrestled with her unwilling muscles, forcing them against the throbbing pain to move. She dragged herself excruciatingly slowly from the support beam she had collapsed against towards the guards' quarters. She could only hope that she could lock the doors. Hell, it's a stretch to hope she can move that far. Her entire front dragged painfully over glass and metal, but she hardly noticed over the sick shivering pain of her screaming muscles. The men outside had made it closer, but without any leadership, the rats were wary of crossing the line into the guards' territory. She pushed desperately with her legs and pulled on the doorframe, dragging herself the last quarter meter. _( not much time if they see me I'm gone ah, god it _hurts ) Suddenly she thought of Victor, how he turned to her at the door of the ship and told her, you don't want this. This job will take your life, and then it'll kill you. He gave her a chance, her final chance to walk out. She remembered her overconfident laugh, how she pushed past him into the sterile, brutal life she'd chosen. And now here she was, straining every screaming muscle to force the unautomated door closed before the inmates turned the corner.


	2. thank you

I don't know what it is about this story, but I find myself coming back to it. Don't expect anything huge out of it, though, it's doubtful this'll turn into anything steady or long-running. But, while it lasts, please review! I thrive on constructive criticism, so even if you don't like it, don't be shy.

Sidenote—does this woman have a name that anybody knows of? I don't want to make one up if she's already got one.

(Blah blah blah, I am a disclaimer)

- -

The woman had her ear pressed to the door, but all that came through were murmurs and tones. Good sign, the door was solid, nobody was going to come crashing through any time soon. The woman had no idea how long she had been here, lying sluggishly conscious at best against the cold metal door: there was a planetary clock up on the wall, but it looked like it had been hit with a stray round. At some point she had struggled the few meters across the room for a med-kit, and somehow had dressed most of her wounds with a roll of morphine tape, but she couldn't precisely remember doing it. But the remainder of the roll was lying next to her hand and the kit was now spilled across the floor, so that must be what had happened.

But now graced with at least temporary consciousness, the woman resolved to use it. Lying unconscious had its perks, not feeling being one of them, but her body needed water, bad. The whole place was kept prepared for the worst of disasters, so there had to be supplies in here somewhere. Trying not to jar any of her numerous injuries, she rolled to her other side to scan the room properly.

_There_. On the second shelf of the open catastrophe closet, a few bottles of water and a supply of MREs. She hadn't registered her hunger before, but just the sight of waiting nourishment, the thought of the taste of hot food, was plenty of motivation to get her moving. In a painfully shambling crawl, the woman forced her body to the open doorway, what felt like ten kilometers away.

The woman cautiously rested her weight on one elbow as she reached for what she needed. Finally, hugging the water bottle to her chest as she laid back down on the cold metal floor, she whispered a prayer, the first in years.

"Thank you."

And what will was left in her rejoiced in the simple ecstasy of water running down her throat and over her face, every drop breathing the same message to her ears. _I am going to live._

- -

Yay! Hope for the merc woman! I feel good about myself now. Now, don't break the cycle of good feeling and review, y'all!


	3. surprise

Note: rough regions of space are defined by their distance and direction from Original Earth, using the 3-D graphing system of z, y, and z axis.

duh: I don't own anything you recognize from the movie

- -

Eve was gaining strength again fast. The morphine tape wasn't too small a factor, but so what? The catastrophe closet had an amazing supply, the guards had probably been hoarding the shit for years while they ignored the prisoners below.

She was sitting on the floor, same place she'd been for days, listening through the door. The rhythm of the prison had changed. ­­­The rooms outside had quickly been stripped of anything resembling a weapon, and the cavern below now rumbled with occasional gunfights. She could only imagine the smell down there, they had been killing each other for days. Surprisingly enough, few convicts spent any real time up in the guardrooms once they were cleaned out. _Figures, _she thought to herself wryly, _that's the one thing I need._

From what she could gather, uniforms had been scavenged from the fallen guards and a large transport ship had been called for, some bullshit story about a fire destroying their equipment. She was still hoping to glean when it would be coming, how long she had to figure out how to stow away, when she overheard a name. _Toombs?_ She pressed her ear against the cool metal door, but the tones and rumbles beyond only allowed the occasional word to reach her.

Heart thumping with fear and desperate hope, she took a deep, quiet breath and steeled herself. She shut her eyes, concentrating on silence with all her might, and dared to slide the door the slightest bit open.

A rough and wiry convict was in the act of sitting on the tabletop, spinning a shiv idly on the tip of his index finger as angry ransacking noises clanged from the left, beyond her slim line of vision.

"Ya sure?" The man on the table called over his shoulder. He had a fast and nasal accent, had to be from somewhere in the plus-x-z region, that turned the word into something more akin to 'shu-ah'.

"Of course I'm fucking sure!" A voice roared from what sounded like the kitchens. "And as soon as I find the shells, I'm going back to ghost the fucker!" startled as a huge crash rang out, and the booming convict proceeded to pitch a class-A fit on the offending kitchen, which was apparently devoid of ammo. Eve eyed the small arsenal piled next to her with relief and an odd sense of pride.

"S'bad sport, ya know," the man on the table said, apparently to the weapon in his hands as a large dark figure stomped across her field of vision. "Killin' a starvin' man ina cage…"

"What, do you want me to nurse him back to health? Fuck you, I'll take what I can get." The voice sounded from the other side of the room as the ransacking noises continued.

The woman­ carefully slid the door back into place. Toombs was _alive_, just down in the hellhound kennel. But not for long if she couldn't do something. The woman braced herself against the door and slowly stood up, pleasantly surprised by the sensation of more stiffness than pain in her wounded right leg. She grabbed a rucksack from the hook on the wall and went to the cat-closet to fill up on the remaining supplies. One thing you could say for the traitorous bastards, they kept an organized guardhouse. Finally dumping a half-shelf of morphine tape on top of the nutrient pills and MREs, she turned back to load up the weapons.

She went down to her knees in front of the pile and set to work. Double-check each gauge before stashing one in the bag, one in the belt, one over a shoulder holster. She went through all the rituals, just like she'd been trained. She clicked shut the last handgun, and as she paused to consider where to store it, a heavy bootstep sounded right on the other side of the door.

"What's here?" A booming voice asked to himself. He was _right there_, right outside, and the realization hit her like a kick to the sternum:

She forgot to lock the door.

- -

So? R and R, don't be shy.


End file.
